Motivational Quotes

Leadership

The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such.

- Maurois, Andre

Best Quotes about Leadership

When the leadership is right and the time is right, the people can always be counted upon to follow -- to the end at all costs.

Seymour, Harold J.

The best leaders... almost without exception and at every level, are master users of stories and symbols.

Peters, Thomas J.

To be a leader, you have to make people want to follow you, and nobody wants to follow someone who doesn't know where he is going.

Namath, Joe

Ronald Reagan has held the two most demeaning jobs in the country; President of the United States and radio broadcaster for the Chicago Cubs.

Will, George F.

It is a characteristic of all movements and crusades that the psychopathic element rises to the top.

Lindner, Robert

The minute a person whose word means a great deal to others dare to take the open-hearted and courageous way, many others follow.

Anderson, Marian

The secret of a leader lies in the tests he has faced over the whole course of his life and the habit of action he develops in meeting those tests.

Sheehy, Gail

The chief executive who knows his strengths and weaknesses as a leader is likely to be far more effective than the one who remains blind to them. He also is on the road to humility -- that priceless attitude of openness to life that can help a manager absorb mistakes, failures, or personal shortcomings.

Adair, John

Delegating work works, provided the one delegating works, too.

Half, Robert

10.

A crown, golden in show is but a wreath of thorns.

Milton, John

11.

In really good companies, you have to lead. You have to come up with big ideas and express them forcefully. I have always been encouraged -- or sometimes forced -- to confront the very natural fear of being wrong. I was constantly pushed to find out what I really thought and then to speak up. Over time, I came to see that waiting to discover which way the wind was blowing is an excellent way to learn how to be a follower.

Enrico, Roger

12.

The penalty of leadership is loneliness.

Robinson, H. Wheeler

13.

Justice is the first virtue of those who command, and stops the complaints of those who obey.

Diderot, Denis

14.

Leadership involves finding a parade and getting in front of it.

Naisbitt, John

15.

The leader seeks to communicate his vision to his followers. He captures their attention with his optimistic intuition of possible solutions to their needs. He influences them by the dynamism of his faith. He demonstrates confidence that the challenge can be met, the need resolved, the crisis overcome.

Haggai, John

16.

I have three precious things which I hold fast and prize. The first is gentleness; the second is frugality; the third is humility, which keeps me from putting myself before others. Be gentle and you can be bold; be frugal and you can be liberal; avoid putting yourself before others and you can become a leader among men.

Lao-Tzu

17.

The manager administers; the leader innovates. The manager has a short-range view; the leader has a long-range perspective. The manager asks how and when; the leader asks what and why. The manager has his eye on the bottom line; the leader has his eye on the horizon. The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it.

Bennis, Warren

18.

A leader is one who, out of madness or goodness, volunteers to take upon himself the woe of the people. There are few men so foolish, hence the erratic quality of leadership in the world.

Updike, John

19.

There is great force hidden in a gentle command.

Herbert, George

20.

The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such.

Maurois, Andre

21.

Napoleon affords us an example of the danger of elevating one's self to the absolute, and sacrificing everything to the carrying out of an idea.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

22.

No one would have doubted his ability to reign had he never been emperor.

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

23.

The lead dog gets the best view. The rest of the dogs view is butt ugly. Of course, the lead dog is also the first to fall into the ravine.

Saunders, Richard

24.

The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men the conviction and the will to carry on. The genius of a good leader is to leave behind him a situation which common sense, without the grace of genius, can deal with successfully.

Lippmann, Walter

25.

It is a great pity when the one who should be the head figure is a mere figure head.

Spurgeon, Charles Haddon

26.

Anyone can steer the ship when the sea is calm.

Syrus, Publilius

27.

Most of the ladies and gentlemen who mourn the passing of the nation's leaders wouldn't know a leader if they saw one. If they had the bad luck to come across a leader, they would find out that he might demand something from them, and this impertinence would put an abrupt and indignant end to their wish for his return.

Lapham, Lewis H.

28.

The nation will find it very hard to look up to the leaders who are keeping their ears to the ground.

Churchill, Winston

29.

I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting along with people.

Gandhi, Mahatma

30.

Leadership is the activity of influencing people to cooperate towards some goal which they come to find desirable and which motivates them over the long haul.

Tead, Orway

31.

A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit.

Glasgow, Arnold H.

32.

Those that rule must hear and be deaf, must see and be blind.

Proverb, German

33.

All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

34.

The person who has no enemies has no followers.

Piatt, Don

35.

Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.

Lombardi, Vince

36.

Reason and judgment are the qualities of a leader.

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

37.

Education is the mother of leadership.

Willkie, Wendell L.

38.

Leadership appears to be the art of getting others to want to do something you are convinced should be done.

Packard, Vance

39.

We are reformers in the spring and summer, but in autumn we stand by the old. Reformers in the morning, and conservers at night.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

40.

The first thing a great person does, is make us realize the insignificance of circumstance.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

41.

When placed in command -- take charge.

Schwarzkopf, Norman

42.

I don't believe in just ordering people to do things. You have to sort of grab an oar and row with them.

Geneen, Harold S.

43.

An army of deer would be more formidable commanded by a lion, than an army of lions commanded by a stag.

Proverb

44.

A leader who doesn't hesitate before he sends his nation into battle is not fit to be a leader.

Meir, Golda

45.

Search others for their virtue, and yourself for your vices.

Fuller, R. Buckminster

46.

You can lead a whore to culture but you can't make her think.

Parker, Dorothy

47.

The speed of the leader determines the rate of the pack.

Lukas, Wayne

48.

The well being of the people is the supreme law.

49.

The best leaders of all, the people know not they exist. They turn to each other and say We did it ourselves.

Saying, Zen

50.

Leadership is not magnetic personality--that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not making friends and influencing people --that is flattery. Leadership is lifting a person's vision to higher sights, the raising of a person's performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.

Drucker, Peter F.